I just want to go through quickly some photos of the property so you get a sense. So this is
frontage um photo again fronting on green street as you can see the front of the property
as you can see from the aerial the property that doesn't actually go all the way across the other
side um a bus of property that rears the front on the opposite street um but this is the frontage
here this is an angle just so you can see the adjacent properties um of the property um as you
can see on the corner there's a large multi-family structure and on the opposite side of the property
three-story buildings and homes along the block base. As you can see on our side of the street,
the media adjacent properties are all three stories and substantially taller than the
existing structure that we have. Now, what are we asking to do here? We're asking
for the board. Apologies, let me zoom out here. There you go. What we're trying to do here
is to propose an adaptive reuse of the existing ground floor auto body shops for use as two
one-bedroom apartments and a two-story addition above the existing structure
for the rest of the units. So, two one-bedroom apartments and one studio
on each floor for a total of eight beds across eight units. So, part of this
project would include, obviously, removing the existing uses, the auto body
garage, removing the existing double-wide curb cut that exists. I don't know if you saw that
with the front edge, but as you can see from this photo here, there's a double-wide curb cut,
removing that, adding two parking spots back on the street, and doing this within the proposed
by right height of 38 feet as you can see with this elevation here. The refusals that
we have for this property is two refusals that are related. One is the, is it in there?
One is just the CMX, the lot limitations on the amount of unit count for CMX2's owning
district as this property is. The lot area restrictions for the unit count within CMX2
contemplates the ground floor being reserved for commercial use. So commercial plus the
allowable residential on top. We're proposing an adaptive reuse of the ground floor, thus
an additional ground floor area of residential space. With the building as it is, in the
two additions, we'll be looking at about 5,862 square feet of GSA ground floor area, which
more than accommodates the proposed unit count in this building.
Now, the second refusal is just, again, tied to the CMX2 use is, as we know, generally
requiring the commercial space on the ground floor.
As you can see from the aerial in the photos, you can see that this is a residential block.
You can see that generally this garage outside of the church on the other side, it's all
residential homes or multi-family. And we believe that the commercial use at this location is actually
out of character, although it predates probably much of what was done in the area. And as such,
we want to make this residential. We think it's more appropriate. Most of the commercial uses in
the area are the corner lots. As you can see from the zoning area, most of them, most of the CMX uses
are on the corner, and thus we believe that the residential use is actually a more fitting use
for this lot area. Now, in terms of what can be done by right, for this project to work for the
vicarios under the buy-write restrictions of the Unicamp, we would have to keep the
auto body shop in operation and add three large apartments ranging from six to nine
beds across them above it within the two-floor addition. So we're looking at about, under
the buy-write plan, we're looking at keeping the auto body use and then adding the additions
up to the buy-write height with the units of about six to nine beds. As our variance proposal,
we're looking at eight beds across eight units as opposed to nine beds across three units plus
maintaining the auto body use. As we know, more beds equals more bodies equals more cars.
So under the buy-write use, we could actually have more beds even though it's less
units and still have the auto body use in operation. In addition to that, if we have
to keep the auto body use there, we have to maintain the double wide curb cut that exists
in the area, thus not being able to basically place two more parking spots back on the street.
And so essentially what we would be doing with the buy right plan that we would have to go with
is just adding to the existing impact of an active auto body shop instead of replacing it.
We believe, and many of the community members agree with us, which you'll see in a second,
that our proposal will have actually a far less impact on the community than the buy-write plan.
We believe that there will be less impact on traffic, parking, and noise, frankly,
that comes along with the operation of an auto body shop.
So, we did meet with the Registered Community Organization, which is Passy Young Square Civic Association, on March 9th.
To be frank, it was clear from the beginning of the meeting that there were some members of the leadership that were against this project in the onset.
And my belief is that I don't believe the project necessarily got in fair shape.
Also, and more importantly, I think, at the beginning of the meeting, we informed or I informed the RCO that there were many community members who were calling in and asked how their participation would be captured in the vote count.
And we did not get a clear answer at that time.
Ultimately, my concern was warranted because after the meeting, we were informed by many neighbors that they either could not gain access.
was informed by many neighbors that they either could not gain access to the meeting via telephone
or they did access the meeting via telephone and was not given the ability to vote.
So I did inform the RCO about this issue and how I believe how our position is that the letter that
they sent in is actually not accurate reflection of the community's position on the project.
Because we did not believe we had an accurate representation of what the community thought about our project, the vicarios took it upon themselves to go door to door and engage directly with the neighbors to make sure, one, that those that did attend and couldn't vote, actually, you know, their voices was heard, and two, making sure that everyone was informed about what they were trying to do.
As you can see from this petition here, we've actually received over 75 signatures in support of the project.
All of the signatures are not only within the catchment area stated within the Civic Association's website, but they're within a three-block radius of the property.
So just so you get a visual sense, what I did was I took all the addresses that were of the people who signed me, signed the petition and sort of plotted them along this map so you could get a sense of how close in proximity all the individuals that voted in support or that signed a petition to support this project were into the property.
This is, I had to go through a couple pages because, unfortunately, my skills as a graphic designer is not the greatest.
I couldn't get fit them all on one page.
But this is just a few pages, again, just to give you a sense.
The blue is the, these are the farthest away.
They're still within three blocks, and these are the closest.
But, again, we received over 75 signatures of support of people that essentially are believed,
Our position is that having eight beds of one-bedroom and studio apartments is a far less impact on traffic, noise, parking, et cetera,
versus having six to nine beds between three units above an active auto body garage.
So, given that the proposal of our project will actually have that lesser impact in the
buy-write proposal and the overwhelming support by neighbors, we're respectfully requesting
that this board approve our variance.
I do have Mr. Vicario here, Fred, if you could raise your hand so you could be recognized.
Mr. Frey, you can unmute yourself.
Fred, could you state and spell your name for the record, please?
Fred Vicario, V like Victor, I-C-A-R-I-O.
Do you swear and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Fred, did you hear the testimony that I provided to the board?
Yes. Do you affirm and adopt the truth of my testimony as your own? Absolutely.
And was there anything that you would like to add?
Just that, you know, my family's been in this neighborhood for
probably 80 years. And my thought, my father had that shop for 60 years. So, you know,
we don't want to do something to harm the community we're trying to do something to
better the community um because at one time everybody always had a problem with like body
shopping in there so we wanted to change the use and frank can i just ask um i know that we
there were some uh board members that met um our proposal our by right plan on some skepticism
regarding the viability of actually being able to maintain auto body use there have
have you and your family received interest
from additional operators for the body shop use?
Yes, yes we have.
Okay, thank you.
Mr. Chair and the board,
we're obviously here to answer any questions,
but I think that concludes our presentation,
reserving the right to respond
to any sort of statements made.
I have Mr. Bertil I know you've said it a couple times but I just want to be clear
I have Mr. Bertil,
I know you've said it a couple of times,
but I just wanna be clear
would you lay out the buy right again yes so the buy right plan so we're able to do go two floors
up by right by right under the CMX2 designation we're allowed three units and so those would be
three very large units. So they would have to be at minimum two and three bedroom apartments.
And the reason you might think like, okay, this building is kind of double wide. Why is it only
three units? And essentially it's because the unit restriction under CMX2 is in conjunction
with the contemplation that the first floor is commercial. And so we do not want to keep
the commercial use under our variance proposal. But if we go with the buy-write plan, we have to
keep it to maintain, to make this work, to make the project work. We have to maintain that commercial
tenant. And as such, for commercial use, it might necessarily be a different operator. It might
still be the same operator. But either way, we have to maintain that commercial use under the
buy right plan all right so correct me if i'm wrong you would buy right gives you three units
it could be two or three bedrooms with the uh allowing for the garage or the body and fender
shop to remain correct that's correct your proposal is for how many bed nine nine single
nine single bedrooms uh no our proposal is for eight uh units um on the first floor it's two
one bedrooms um and then on the second and third floor two one bedrooms and two studios
so i guess in total it's six one bedrooms and two studios
so eight beds across all the apartments eight beds eight beds versus nine six to nine beds
likely nine yeah six to nine i get it and what is the square footage of the studios
I have the studios themselves I don't know if you can see the writing here let me zoom in
so the studio is 347 and a half square feet each of them are the same size uh yeah the second and
third floor should be identical. What's the square footage of the other units?
The one bedrooms on the second and third floor are, one is 418 square feet
and the ones that are more to the rear are 463 square feet. Now that's the second and third
floor because they're basically their floor plan is identical. The first floor
has two one-bedroom. That's a different layout. I'm trying to see if I can.
I think they have the total square footage of those.
And the, okay, obviously this was all made known to the RCO, right?
That's correct. This floor plan, these floor plans, excuse me, in the zoning plan was presented to the RCO. And I should just say this to Ms. Suzanne Tavani was my initial contact with the RCO.
So she did have to take some sort of leave of absence.
So there was a period of time where my concerns regarding the inaccurate reporting of the voting due to the votes were unanswered.
But I learned later on that it was due to her having to take leave of absence for personal reasons.
So I certainly understand that, but I still wanted to, you know, reflect for the record that we did inform the RCO when we became aware of the issue.
What was the count of the RCO meeting, support versus non-support?
I believe it was 17 in opposition and six in support, but there were over, and I know because I looked on, I thought the number was strange when I saw the letter.
I know there was over 40, 45 people on that call.
So that, one, I know everyone didn't vote, but then I was informed that the RCO sort of doesn't count votes of anyone that's not in there.
sort of doesn't count votes of anyone that's not in their catchment area for the RCO or that's
related to the project, which I certainly understand, except when we went out and got
the signatures, well, their catchment area on their own website is described as from Broad Street
to 6th Street and from Washington to Taster Street. And then every signature on our petition
is certainly within that um but not only that they're all within three blocks of the except
for maybe one is like right on the edge one or two right on the edge of three blocks but every
other one is within three blocks the majority is with it's either on the same block or within a
block of the property yeah i'm familiar because i live not far from there i'm very familiar with
that all right um questions from the board no no no what else would like to testify in this case
please raise your hand. Chair, we have a Jeff Brown.
Mr. Brown, please identify yourself. Yes, my name is Jeff Brown. I live at 910 Greenwich. I've been
here for 35 years. Mr. Brown, do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and
nothing but the truth? I do. Thank you. Please proceed. Yes, I and many of the neighbors on the
900 block of Greenwich Street oppose this proposal on numerous basis. Number one, on density. They're
talking about putting in eight units, there are only about 20 single-family houses on Greenwich
Street, and this is now proposing to add eight more units. And eight units, and as we've just
said, some of the units are 400, a little bit more than 400 square feet. They're tiny units. This is
not manhattan this is south philly uh you know it's they're very tiny units um we also uh question
the um the the open space where is the open space uh in the in the lot um where is the egress for
the second third floor if there's a an emergency for them to uh to leave where is trash going to
be stored. Also, going up three stories in the rear is going to block light and air of the
backyards and the gardens of people that are on both Greenwich and Cross streets. And there's
always the issue of parking. Eight additional units, even if people are riding bikes and walking
and taking public transit, is going to bring a lot more traffic to an already very crowded street.
In addition to that, the person said that they went and they got petitions, and I saw some of the signatures of petitions, nobody came to my door asking to sign a petition or to many of my neighbors to go sign a petition.
So, I mean, it's good for them to get the signatures from people that live on Tasker Street and other streets further away.
This is Greenwich Street.
This is where we live.
and it's just too dense it's not appropriate for the uh for our block thank you mr brown
mr chair if i could just respond to i'll try to make it as quick as possible um first i just want
to highlight that in terms of the well first i should mention that the height um we can go up
to 38 feet rick whether we get a variance or not like our by right it's going to be the same height
whether we go with the buy-write plan or we go, or we're granted with the variance.
So to me, that's really not a non-issue.
In terms of the egress, one, that's, I mean, that's not a zoning matter, but even if it was,
we haven't received, as far as my understanding is, everything that we've done thus far
hasn't generated any dimensional variances or referrals, for that matter.
The only variances we have is for the use of residential versus commercial and then the density of the residential.
Not only that, as you can see, there's literally immediately attached to the building.
There's a large residential apartment building.
That was a factory at one time.
That's right.
And so in terms of the sort of community context and things of that nature, I don't think that's the residential multifamily use is something that doesn't exist here, obviously.
And so in terms of the...
And then again, when it comes to traffic, I already read it, read it, so I won't beat a dead horse.
But we believe and I think many of the people who signed this position believe that a commercial auto body garage is going to generate with apartments above is going to generate far more traffic and parking issues than our proposed use.
I mean, outside of just the cars that are coming there to be worked on, just prospective customers, people coming for quotes, things of that nature, that in and out of a business like that is continuous throughout the day.
and more of a burden on parking and traffic than what we're trying to do here.
And admittedly, we do not have a signature of support from the gentleman that just spoke,
obviously, or he wouldn't have said that, but that doesn't, just because the gentleman,
I'm sorry, I didn't remember his name, didn't sign the position on the spot.
Jeffrey Brown.
Yes, there are other people on Greenwich, on Cross, further up on Greenwich, on Dickinson, on 10th, that signed the petition as well.
As you can see, his parcel is not highlighted.